Category: The Conversation – Global Perspectives

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By R. Evan Ellis, Senior Associate, Americas Program, The Center for Strategic and International Studies

The predawn seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on Jan. 3, 2026 was a complicated affair. It was also, operationally, a resounding success for the U.S. military.

Operation Absolute Resolve achieved its objective of seizing Maduro through a mix of extensive planning, intelligence and timing. R. Evan Ellis, a military strategist and former Latin America policy adviser to the U.S. State Department, walked The Conversation through what is publicly known about the planning and execution of the raid.

How long would this op have been in the works?

Operation Absolute Resolve was some months in the planning, as the Pentagon acknowledged in its briefing on Jan. 3. My presumption is that from the beginning of the U.S. military buildup in the Caribbean and the establishment of Joint Task Force Southern Spear in the fall, military planners were developing options for the president to capture or eliminate Maduro and other key Chavista leadership, should coercive efforts at persuading a change in the Venezuelan situation fail.

Prior to Southern Spear, U.S. military activities in the region were directly overseen by Southern Command – the part of the Department of Defense responsible for Central America, South America and most of the Caribbean. But establishing a dedicated joint task force in October 2025 helped facilitate the coordination of a large operation, like the one conducted to seize Maduro.

Planning for the Jan. 3 operation likely became more detailed and realistic as the administration settled on a concrete set of options. U.S. forces practiced the raid on a replica of the presidential compound. “They actually built a house which was identical to the one they went into with all the same, all that steel all over the place,” President Donald Trump told “Fox & Friends Weekend.”

Why did the US choose to act now?

The buildup had been going on for months, and the arrival of the USS Gerald R. Ford in November was a key milestone. That gave the U.S. the capability to launch a high volume of attacks against land targets and added to the already huge array of American military hardware stationed in the Caribbean.

It joined an Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group, which included a helicopter dock ship and two landing platform vessels. An additional six destroyers and two cruisers were stationed in the region with the capability of launching hundreds of missiles for both land attack and air defense, as well as a special operations mother ship.

Trump’s authorization of CIA operations in Venezuela was probably also a key factor. It is likely that individuals inside Venezuela played invaluable roles not only in obtaining intelligence, but also in cooperating with key people in Maduro’s military and government to make sure they did – or did not do – certain things at key moments during the Jan. 3 operation.

With the complex array of plans and preparations in place by December, the U.S. military was likely ready to execute, but it had to wait for opportune conditions to maximize the probability of success.

What constitutes the opportune moment?

There are arguably three things needed for the opportune moment: good intelligence, the establishment of reliable cooperation arrangements on the ground, and favorable tactical conditions.

Intel would have been crucial. Trump acknowledged his authorization of covert CIA operations in Venezuela in October, and evidently, by the end of the year, analysts had gathered the information needed to make this operation go smoothly. The intelligence would have had to include knowing exactly where Maduro would be at the time of the operation, and the situation around him.

Over the past few months, according to media reporting, the intelligence community had agents on the ground in Venezuela, likely having conversations with people in the military, the Chavista leadership and beyond, who had crucial information or whose behavior was relevant to different parts of the operation – such as perhaps shutting down a system, standing down a military unit or being absent from a post at a key moment. A report from The New York Times indicates that the U.S. had a human source close to Maduro who was able to provide details of his day-to-day life, down to what he ate.

The more tactical conditions that were needed for the opportune moment involved things like the weather – you didn’t want storms or high winds or cloud cover that would put U.S. aircraft in danger as they flew in some very treacherous low-level routes through the mountains that separate Fort Tiun – the military compound in Caracas where Maduro was captured – from the coast.

How did the operation unfold?

Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has given some details about how the plan was executed.

We know the U.S. launched aircraft from multiple sites – the operation involved at least 20 different launch sites for 150 planes and helicopters. These would have involved aircraft for jamming operations, some surveillance, fighter jets to strike targets, and some to provide an escort for the helicopters bringing in a special forces unit and members of the FBI.

As an integral part of the operation, the U.S. carried out a series of cyber activities that may have played a role in undermining not only Venezuela’s defense systems, but also its understanding of what was going on. Although the nature of U.S. cyber activities is only speculation here, a coherent, alerted Venezuelan command and control system could have cost the lives of U.S. force members and given Maduro time to seal himself in his safe room, creating a problem – albeit not an insurmountable one – for U.S. forces.

There was also, according to Trump, a U.S.-generated interruption to some part of the power grid. In addition, it appears that there may have been diversionary strikes in other parts of the country to give a false impression to the Venezuelan military that U.S. military activity was directed toward some other, lesser land target, as had recently been the case.

U.S. aircraft then basically disabled Venezuelan air defenses.

As U.S. rotary wing and other assets converged on the target in Caracas – with cover from some of the most capable fighters in the U.S. inventory, including F-35s and F-22s, as well as F-18s – other U.S. assets decimated the air defense and other threats in the area.

It would be logical if elite members of the U.S. 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment were used in the approach to the compound in Caracas. Their skills would have been required if, as I presume, they came in via the canyon route that separates Caracas from the coast. I have driven the road through those mountains, and it is treacherous – especially for an aircraft at low altitude.

Once the team landed, it would have have taken a matter of minutes to infiltrate the compound where Maduro was.

Any luck involved?

According to Trump, the U.S. team grabbed Maduro just as he was trying to get into his steel vault safe room.

“He didn’t get that space closed. He was trying to get into it, but he got bum-rushed right so fast that he didn’t get into that,” the U.S. president told Fox & Friends Weekend.

Although the U.S. was reportedly fully prepared for that eventuality, with high-power torches to cut him out, that delay could have cost time and possibly lives.

It was thus critical to the U.S. mission that forces were able to enter the facility, reach and secure Maduro and his wife in a minimal amount of time.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent the Department of Defense or the US government.

– ref. How Maduro’s capture went down – a military strategist explains what goes into a successful special op – https://theconversation.com/how-maduros-capture-went-down-a-military-strategist-explains-what-goes-into-a-successful-special-op-272671

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Juan Luis Manfredi, Prince of Asturias Distinguished Professor @Georgetown, Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha

On the back of every dollar bill, the phrase Novus Ordo Seclorum (“New order of the ages”) hints at the principle guiding the US’ new security strategy.

The attack on Venezuela and the capture of President Nicolás Maduro herald the decoupling of Trump’s United States from the rules-based international order, and the end of liberal order as a whole. A new international order is now emerging, based on the use of force, revisionism and security on the American continent.

Here are five keys to understanding the outcomes of the military intervention, and the new order it ushers in.

1. Expanded presidential power

The attack cements the new doctrine of an imperious president, one who executes orders without waiting for congressional approval, legal validation or media opinion.

With checks and balances weakened, the second Trump administration is free to present the new order as a question of urgent security: with the US at war against drug trafficking (or migration) and threatened by “new powers” (a euphemism for China), it has no need to respect proper procedures or timelines.

Trump identifies himself with historic, founding American presidents like Washington, Lincoln and Roosevelt. All three were charismatic leaders, and with the 250th anniversary of the US republic approaching such comparisons feed into Trump’s authoritarian rhetoric.

Erosion of the US political and legal system is undeniable. The president has approved an extensive package of regulations that promote emergency powers, a permanent state of crisis, and suppression of political opposition and the judicial system. The attack on Venezuela is yet another milestone in the reconfiguration of the presidency’s relations to the legislative and judicial branches of power, in line with the Hamiltonian tradition of a strong and unifying executive branch.

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2. (Latin) America for the (US) Americans

On the international stage, the attack on Venezuela advances a diplomatic agenda that is rooted in the defence of national interests. The concept of “America for the Americans” has made a strong comeback: Panama, Mexico and Canada have all been made to bow to Trump’s will, while the administration continues to push for control of Greenland.

In Latin America, Brazil and Colombia’s left-wing governments lead regional opposition to the US, while Chile’s newly elected José Antonio Kast and Argentina’s Javier Milei are Trump’s ideological allies. The continent as a whole is witnessing a broad shift towards nationalist, right-wing parties that oppose migration.

If Venezuela’s post-Maduro transition aligns with these values, any hope for national unity and a peaceful transition to full democracy will disappear.

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3. Control of resources

Once again, it’s all about oil, but for different reasons than in Iraq. In a world where globalisation has shifted to geoeconomics, the United States wants to project its power in international energy markets and regulation. Venezuela’s infrastructure, ports and minerals are key to making this happen.

The US therefore doesn’t just want Venezuelan oil to supply its domestic market – it also wants to impose international prices and dominate supply. Its new vision aims to align energy sovereignty and technological development with trade and security.

Pax Silica – the international US-led alliance signed at the end of 2025 to secure supply chains for critical technologies such as semiconductors and AI – ushers in an era of transactional diplomacy: computer chips in exchange for minerals. For the “new” Venezuela, its oil reserves will allow it to participate in this new power dynamic.

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4. Geopolitical realignment

The American view of territory fuels a revisionist foreign policy based on sovereignty – similar to those of China, Israel, or Russia – which is rooted in the concept of “nomos”, as defined by mid-20th century German philosopher Carl Schmitt. This is a worldview where the division of nations into “friend or foe” prevails over a liberal worldview governed by cooperation, international law, democracy and the free market.

Under this logic, spheres of influence emerge, resources are distributed, and power blocs are balanced, as the above examples demonstrate: without opposition, China would dominate Southeast Asia, Russia would scale back its war in exchange for 20% of Ukraine and control over its material resources and energy, and Israel would redraw the map of the Middle East and strike trade agreements with neighbouring countries.

5. Europe, democracy and Hobbes

Ideals like democracy, the rule of law and free trade are fading fast, and without effective capacity, things don’t end well for the European Union. As we have seen with Gaza, the EU often has strong ideological disagreement with other major powers but doesn’t command enough respect to do anything. The US’ military intervention revives Hobbesian political realism, where freedom is ceded to an absolute sovereign in exchange for peace and security.

In Trump’s new order, it is presidential authority – not truth, laws or democratic values – that has the final say.

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US domestic politics

2026 is an election year in the US, with 39 gubernatorial elections and a raft of state and local elections to be contested between March and November.

Through its actions in Venezuela, the Trump administration is effectively debating its model for succession. One faction, led by JD Vance, wants to avoid problems abroad and to renew the industrial economic model. The other, led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, is committed to rebuilding the international order with a strong and dominant US. The outcome of the Venezuelan operation may tip the balance, and could determine Trump’s successor in the 2028 presidential elections.

The attack on Venezuela is not just an intervention in the region: it also reflects the changing times in which we live. While international Trumpism was previously confined to disjointed slogans, it has now taken its first step into military strategy. Gone are the days of soft power, transatlantic relations and peace in Ibero-America. A new order is being born.

Juan Luis Manfredi no recibe salario, ni ejerce labores de consultoría, ni posee acciones, ni recibe financiación de ninguna compañía u organización que pueda obtener beneficio de este artículo, y ha declarado carecer de vínculos relevantes más allá del cargo académico citado.

– ref. Trump’s new world order is taking shape in Venezuela. Five keys to understanding the US military attacks – https://theconversation.com/trumps-new-world-order-is-taking-shape-in-venezuela-five-keys-to-understanding-the-us-military-attacks-272673

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Alan McPherson, Professor of History, Temple University

In the dead of night during the holidays, the United States launched an operation inside a Latin American country, intent on seizing its leader on the pretext that he is wanted in U.S. courts on drug charges.

The date was Dec. 20, 1989, the country was Panama, and the wanted man was General Manuel Noriega.

Many people in the Americas waking up on Jan. 3, 2026, may have been feeling a sense of déjà vu.

Images of dark U.S. helicopters flying over a Latin American capital seemed, until recently, like a bygone relic of American imperialism – incongruous since the end of the Cold War.

But the seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, along with his wife, Cilia Flores, recalls an earlier era of U.S. foreign policy.

U.S. President Donald Trump announced that, in an overnight operation, U.S. troops captured and spirited the couple out of Caracas, the Venezuelan capital. It followed what Trump described as an “extraordinary military operation” involving air, land and sea forces.

Maduro and his wife were flown to New York to face drug charges. While Maduro was indicted in 2020 on charges that he led a narco-terrorism operation, his wife was only added in a fresh indictment that also included four other named Venezuelans.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he “anticipates no further action” in Venezuela; Trump later said the he wasn’t afraid of American “boots on the ground.”

Whatever happens, as an expert on U.S.-Latin American relations, I see the U.S. operation in Venezuela as a clear break from the recent past. The seizure of a foreign leader – albeit one who clung to power through dubious electoral means – amounts to a form of ad hoc imperialism, a blatant sign of the Trump administration’s aggressive but unfocused might-makes-right approach to Latin America.

It eschews the diplomatic approach that has been the hallmark of inter-American relations for decades, really since the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s took away the ideological grab over potential spheres of influence in the region.

Instead, it reverts to an earlier period when gunboats — yesteryear’s choppers — sought to achieve U.S. political aims in a neighboring region that American officials treated as the “American lake” – as one World War II Navy officer referred to the Caribbean.

Breaking with precedent

The renaming of the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America” – one of the earliest acts of the second Trump administration – fits this new policy pivot.

But in key ways, there is no precedent to the Trump administration’s operation to remove Maduro.

Never before has the U.S. military directly intervened in South America to effect regime change. All of Washington’s previous direct actions were in smaller, closer countries in Central America or the Caribbean.

The U.S. intervened often in Mexico but never decapitated its leadership directly or took over the entire country. In South America, interventions tended to be indirect: Lyndon Johnson had a backup plan in case the 1964 coup in Brazil did not succeed (it did); Richard Nixon undermined the socialist government in Chile from 1970 on but did not orchestrate the coup against President Salvador Allende in 1973.

And while Secretary of State Henry Kissinger – the architect of U.S. foreign policy under Nixon and his successor, Gerald Ford – and others encouraged repression against leftists throughout the 1970s, they held back from taking a direct part in it.

A post-Maduro plan?

U.S. officials long viewed South American countries as too far away, too big and too independent to call for direct intervention.

Apparently, Trump’s officials paid that historical demarcation little heed.

What is to happen to Venezuela after Maduro? Taking him into U.S. custody lays bare that the primary goal of a monthslong campaign of American military attacking alleged drug ships and oil tankers was always likely regime change, rather than making any real dent in the amount of illegal drugs reaching U.S. shores. As it is, next to no fentanyl leaves Venezuela, and most Venezuelan cocaine heads to Europe, anyway.

What will preoccupy many regional governments in Latin America, and policy experts in Washington, is whether the White House has considered the consequences to this latest escalation.

Trump no doubt wants to avoid another Iraq War disaster, and as such he will want to limit any ongoing U.S. military and law enforcement presence. But typically, a U.S. force changing a Latin American regime has had to stay on the ground to install a friendly leader and maybe oversee a stable transition or elections.

Simply plucking Maduro out of Caracas does not do that. The Venezuela constitution says that his vice president is to take over. And Vice President Delcy Rodriguez, who is demanding proof of life of her president, is no anti-Maduro figure.

Regime change would require installing those who legitimately won the 2024 election, and they are assuredly who Rubio wants installed next in Miraflores Palace.

Conflicting demands

With Trump weighing the demands of two groups – anti-leftist hawks in Washington and an anti-interventionist base of MAGA supporters – a power struggle in Washington could emerge. It will be decided by men who may have overlapping but different reasons for action in Venezuela: Rubio, who wants to burnish his image as an anti-communist bringer of democracy abroad; Trump, a transactional leader who seemingly has eyes on Venezuela’s oil; and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who has shown a desire to flex America’s military muscle.

What exactly is the hierarchy of these goals? We might soon find out. But either way, a Rubicon has been crossed by the Trump administration. Decades of U.S. policy toward neighbors in the south have been ripped up.

The capture of Maduro could displace millions more Venezuelans and destabilize neighboring countries – certainly it will affect their relationship with Washington. And while the operation to remove Maduro was clearly thought out with military precision, the concern is that less attention has been paid to an equally important aspect: what happens next.

“We’re going to run the country” until a “safe, proper and judicious transition” occurs, the Trump promised. But that is easier said than done.

Alan McPherson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A predawn op in Latin America? The US has been here before, but the seizure of Venezuela’s Maduro is still unprecedented – https://theconversation.com/a-predawn-op-in-latin-america-the-us-has-been-here-before-but-the-seizure-of-venezuelas-maduro-is-still-unprecedented-272664

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Andrew Gawthorpe, Lecturer in History and International Studies, Leiden University

Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, has been apprehended and flown to the US where the US attorney-general has announced he will face charges of drug trafficking and narco-terrorism. The US military’s operation to snatch Maduro was carried out in the early hours of January 3 and follows months of steadily mounting pressure on the Venezuelan government.

Now it appears that the US operation to remove a leader it has designated as a “narco-terrorist” has come to fruition. But whether the capture and removal of Maduro will lead to regime change in the oil-rich Latin American country remains unclear at present.

The US campaign against Venezuela is the product of two distinct policy impulses within the Trump administration. The first is the long held desire of many Republican hawks, including the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, to force regime change in Caracas. They detest Venezuela’s socialist government and see overturning it as an opportunity to appeal to conservative Hispanic voters in the US.

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The second impulse is more complex. Trump campaigned for election in 2024 on the idea that his administration would not become involved in foreign conflicts. But his administration claims that Venezuela’s government and military are involved in drug trafficking, which in Washington’s thinking makes them terrorist organisations that are harming the American people. As head of the country’s government, Maduro, according to the Trump administration’s logic is responsible for that.

During Trump’s first administration, his Department of Justice indicted Maduro on charges of “narco-terrorism”. Now Bondi says there might be a new indictment which also covers Maduro’s wife, who was taken into detention with him. The fact that US law enforcement was involved in their capture reinforces the idea that they will now face those charges in a New York court, despite an early claim by opposition sources in Venezuela that Maduro’s departure may have been negotiated with the US government.

What comes next?

The big question is what comes next in Venezuela, and whether either the Republican hawks or the “America first” crowd will get the outcome that they want: ongoing US military presence to “finish the job” or simply a show of US strength to punish its adversary which doesn’t involve a lengthy American involvement.

The US has discovered time and again in recent decades that it is extremely difficult to dictate the political futures of foreign countries with military force. The White House might want to see the emergence of a non-socialist government in Caracas, as well as one which cracks down on the drug trade. But simply removing Maduro and dropping some bombs is unlikely to achieve that goal after nearly three decades of bulding up the regime under Maduro and his predecessor Hugo Chavez.

The Trump administration could have learned this lesson from Libya, whose dictatorial government the US and its allies overthrew in 2011. The country collapsed into chaos soon after, inflicting widespread suffering on its own citizens and creating problems for its neighbours.

In the case of Venezuela, it is unlikely that American military’s strikes alone will be enough to fatally undermine its government. Maduro may be gone, but the vast majority of the country’s governmental and military apparatus remains intact. Power will likely pass to a new figure in the regime.

The White House may dream that popular protests will break out against the government following Maduro’s ousting. But history shows that people usually react to being bombed by a foreign power by rallying around the flag, not turning against their leaders.

Nor would Venezuela’s descent into chaos be likely to help the Trump administration achieve its goals. Conflict in Venezuela could generate new refugee flows which would eventually reach America’s southern border. The collapse of central government authority would be likely to create a more conducive environment for drug trafficking. Widespread internal violence and human rights violations could hardly be portrayed as a victory to the crucial conservative Hispanic voting bloc.

If the Trump administration dreams of establishing a stable, pro-American government in Caracas, it is going to have to do more than just arrest Maduro. Bringing about durable regime change typically involves occupying a country with ground troops and engaging in “nation building”. The US tried this with decidedly mixed results in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Trump has pledged to avoid such entanglements and Rubio has said that, for now at least, the US has no plans for further military action against Venezuela. Trump has a penchant for flashy, quick wins, particularly in foreign policy. He may hope to tout Maduro’s capture as a victory and move on to other matters.

Nation-building failures

In almost no recent US military intervention did the American government set out to engage in nation-building right from the beginning. The perceived need to shepherd a new government into existence has typically only come to be felt when the limits of what can be accomplished by military force alone become apparent.

The war in Afghanistan, for instance, started as a war of revenge for the terrorist attacks on the US on September 11 2001 before transforming into a 20-year nation-building commitment. In Iraq, the Bush administration thought that it could depose Saddam Hussein and leave within a few months. The US ended up staying for nearly a decade.

It’s hard to imagine Trump walking down the same path, if only because he has always portrayed nation-building as a waste of American lives and treasure. But that still leaves him with no plausible way to achieve the divergent political outcomes he, his supporters and America’s foreign policy establishment want with the tools that he has at his disposal.

Meanwhile the US president will face pressure from a range of constituencies from Republican hawks to conservative Hispanic voters to force wholesale regime change in Venezuela. How Trump responds to that pressure will determine the future course of US policy towards the country.

Andrew Gawthorpe is affiliated with the Foreign Policy Centre in London.

– ref. US snatches Maduro in raid on Caracas: what we know so far – https://theconversation.com/us-snatches-maduro-in-raid-on-caracas-what-we-know-so-far-272660

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Justin Bergman, International Affairs Editor, The Conversation

We used to have a pretty clear idea of what an autocrat was. History is full of examples: Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, along with Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping today. The list goes on.

So, where does Donald Trump fit in?

In this six-part podcast series, The Making of an Autocrat, we are asking six experts on authoritarianism and US politics to explain how exactly an autocrat is made – and whether Trump is on his way to becoming one.

Like strongmen around the world, Trump’s first step was to take control of a party, explains Erica Frantz, associate professor of political science at Michigan State University.

Trump began this process long before his victory in the 2024 US presidential election. When he first entered the political stage in 2015, he started to transform the Republican Party into his party, alienating his critics, elevating his loyalists to positions of power and maintaining total control through threats and intimidation.

And once a would-be autocrat dominates a party like this, they have a legitimate vehicle to begin dismantling a democracy. As Frantz explains:

Now, many Republican elites see it as political suicide to stand up to Trump. So, fast forward to 2024, and we have a very personalist Trump party – the party is synonymous with Trump.

Not only does the party have a majority in the legislature, but it is Trump’s vehicle. And our research has shown this is a major red flag for democracy. It’s going to enable Trump to get rid of executive constraints in a variety of domains, which he has, and pursue his strongman agenda.

Listen to the interview with Erica Frantz at The Making of an Autocrat podcast.

This episode was written by Justin Bergman and produced and edited by Isabella Podwinski and Ashlynne McGhee. Sound design by Michelle Macklem.

Newsclips in this episode from CNN, The Telegraph, CNN and Nayib Bukele’s YouTube channel.

Listen to The Conversation Weekly via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our RSS feedor find out how else to listen here. A transcript of this episode is available via the Apple Podcasts or Spotify apps.

Erica Frantz is a research fellow at the Charles F. Kettering Foundation.

– ref. Donald Trump’s first step to becoming a would-be autocrat – hijacking a party – https://theconversation.com/donald-trumps-first-step-to-becoming-a-would-be-autocrat-hijacking-a-party-271849

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Ben McCann, Associate Professor of French Studies, University of Adelaide

Brigitte Bardot’s death, at the age of 91, brings to a close one of the most extraordinary careers in post-war French cultural life.

Best known as an actress, she was also a singer, a fashion icon, an animal rights activist and a symbol of France’s sexual liberation.

Famous enough to be known by her initials, B.B. symbolised a certain vision of French femininity – rebellious and sensual, yet vulnerable.

Her impact on beauty standards and French national identity was profound. At her peak, she rivalled Marilyn Monroe in global fame and recognition. Simone de Beauvoir, France’s leading feminist writer, famously wrote in 1959 that Bardot “appears as a force of nature, dangerous so long as she remains untamed”.

A star is born

Bardot was born in 1934 to a well-off Parisian family. Raised in a strict Catholic household, she studied ballet at the Conservatoire de Paris with hopes of becoming a professional dancer.

Her striking looks led her to modelling. By 14, she was appearing in Elle magazine, catching the eye of director Roger Vadim, whom she married in 1952.

She began acting in the early 1950s and her appearance as Juliette in Vadim’s And God Created Woman (Et Dieu… créa la femme, 1956) put her on the map.

Bardot was instantly catapulted to international stardom. Vadim presented his wife as the ultimate expression of youthful, erotic freedom that both shocked and captivated French audiences.

Watching this relatively tame film today, it’s difficult to imagine just how taboo-breaking Bardot’s performance was. But in sleepy Catholic, conservative 1950s France, it set new norms for on-screen sexuality.

The film became a global phenomenon. Critics loved it, but censors and religious groups grew nervous.

An 60s icon

Bardot’s lack of formal training as an actress paradoxically became part of her appeal: she adopted a spontaneous acting approach, as much physical as verbal.

She was stunning in Contempt (Le Mépris, 1963), Jean-Luc Godard’s masterpiece about a crumbling marriage. Godard used her beauty and fame both as spectacle and critique. The film’s most famous sequence was a 31-minute conversation between Bardot and her co-star Michel Piccoli. Bardot was never better.

In Henri-Georges Clouzot’s intense courtroom drama The Truth (La Vérité, 1960), she showcased her dramatic range playing a young woman on trial for the murder of her lover.

In 1965, she co-starred with Jeanne Moreau in Louis Malle’s Long Live Maria (Viva Maria), a rare female buddy film that blended comedy and political satire. Bardot’s anarchic energy remains a dazzling feat.

A Very Private Affair (Vie privée, 1962) saw her portray a woman consumed by fame and chased by the media. The plotline was eerily predictive of Bardot’s own future.

She popularised fashion trends like the choucroute hairstyle and ballet flats. The Bardot neckline – off-the-shoulder tops and dresses – was named after her. She even wore pink gingham at her 1959 wedding.

Allure and provocation

Bardot’s star appeal lay in her contradictions. She appeared simultaneously natural and provocative, spontaneous and calculated. Her dishevelled glamour and effortless sexuality helped construct the archetype of the modern “sex kitten”.

She famously said “it is better to be unfaithful than to be faithful without wanting to be”.

Throwing off the shackles of bourgeois morality, Bardot epitomised a commitment to emotional and sexual freedom. Her turbulent love life was a case in point. She was married four times, with dozens of stormy relationships and extra-marital affairs along the way.

Forever immortalised as a free-spirited ingénue, Bardot was a muse for filmmakers, artists and musicians, from Andy Warhol to Serge Gainsbourg. Later on, Kate Moss, Amy Winehouse and Elle Fanning mentioned Bardot as an inspiration.

Famously, Bardot never succumbed to cosmetic surgery. As she once noted:

Women should embrace ageing because, at the end of the day, it’s much more beautiful to have a grandmother with white hair who looks like an elderly lady than to have a grandmother who’s bleached, dyed, and […] who looks much older but also really unhappy.

Life after the movies

Bardot retired from acting in 1973, aged only 39, citing disillusionment with fame. “It suffocated and destroyed me”, she said, about the film industry.

She shifted her attention to animal rights, founding the Brigitte Bardot Foundation in 1986. She became an uncompromising, vocal activist, campaigning against animal cruelty, fur farming, whaling and bullfighting.

But Bardot courted controversy from the mid-1990s for her far-right political views, remarks about Islam and immigration and repeated convictions for inciting racial hatred. She publicly defended disgraced actor Gérard Depardieu and pushed back on the #MeToo movement in France.

Such statements damaged her reputation, especially outside France, and created a troubling image: the once-liberating sex symbol now associated with nationalist conservatism.

While she never identified as a feminist, her unapologetic autonomy, early retirement and outspoken views led some to re-evaluate her as a figure of proto-feminist rebellion.

France gradually began to turn against Bardot, bothered by her outspoken views. But some applauded her couldn’t-care-less attitude and unwillingness to play by the rules.

Ultimately, by rejecting fame on her own terms, she parlayed her 50s free-spiritedness into a bold stand against conformity and societal norms.

Late in life, she told Danièle Thompson, the writer-director of the 2023 mini-series about her career, “I don’t understand why the whole world is still talking about me”.

The answer is simple – Bardot continues to fascinate us, flaws and all.

Ben McCann does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Brigitte Bardot defined the modern woman and defied social norms – https://theconversation.com/brigitte-bardot-defined-the-modern-woman-and-defied-social-norms-261659

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Joan Taylor, Professor Emerita of Christian Origins and Second Temple Judaism, King’s College London

Every year, millions of people sing the beautiful carol Silent Night, with its line “all is calm, all is bright”.

We all know the Christmas story is one in which peace and joy are proclaimed, and this permeates our festivities, family gatherings and present-giving. Countless Christmas cards depict the Holy Family – starlit, in a quaint stable, nestled comfortably in a sleepy little village.

However, when I began to research my book on the childhood of Jesus, Boy Jesus: Growing up Judaean in Turbulent Times, that carol started to sound jarringly wrong in terms of his family’s actual circumstances at the time he was born.

The Gospel stories themselves tell of dislocation and danger. For example, a “manger” was, in fact, a foul-smelling feeding trough for donkeys. A newborn baby laid in one is a profound sign given to the shepherds, who were guarding their flocks at night from dangerous wild animals (Luke 2:12).

When these stories are unpacked for their core elements and placed in a wider historical context, the dangers become even more glaring.

Take King Herod, for example. He enters the scene in the nativity stories without any introduction at all, and readers are supposed to know he was bad news. But Herod was appointed by the Romans as their trusted client ruler of the province of Judaea. He stayed long in his post because he was – in Roman terms – doing a reasonable job.

Jesus’ family claimed to be of the lineage of Judaean kings, descended from David and expected to bring forth a future ruler. The Gospel of Matthew begins with Jesus’ entire genealogy, it was that important to his identity.

But a few years before Jesus’ birth, Herod had violated the tomb of David and looted it. How did that affect the family and the stories they would tell Jesus? How did they feel about the Romans?

A time of fear and revolt

As for Herod’s attitude to Bethlehem, remembered as David’s home, things get yet more dangerous and complex.

When Herod was first appointed, he was evicted by a rival ruler supported by the Parthians (Rome’s enemy) who was loved by many local people. Herod was attacked by those people just near Bethlehem.

He and his forces fought back and massacred the attackers. When Rome vanquished the rival and brought Herod back, he built a memorial to his victorious massacre on a nearby site he called Herodium, overlooking Bethlehem. How did that make the local people feel?

And far from being a sleepy village, Bethlehem was so significant as a town that a major aqueduct construction brought water to its centre. Fearing Herod, Jesus’ family fled from their home there, but they were on the wrong side of Rome from the start.

They were not alone in their fears or their attitude to the colonisers. The events that unfolded, as told by the first-century historian Josephus, show a nation in open revolt against Rome shortly after Jesus was born.

When Herod died, thousands of people took over the Jerusalem temple and demanded liberation. Herod’s son Archelaus massacred them. A number of Judaean revolutionary would-be kings and rulers seized control of parts of the country, including Galilee.

It was at this time, in the Gospel of Matthew, that Joseph brought his family back from refuge in Egypt – to this independent Galilee and a village there, Nazareth.

But independence in Galilee didn’t last long. Roman forces, under the general Varus, marched down from Syria with allied forces, destroyed the nearby city of Sepphoris, torched countless villages and crucified huge numbers of Judaean rebels, eventually putting down the revolts.

Archelaus – once he was installed officially as ruler – followed this up with a continuing reign of terror.

A nativity story for today

As a historian, I’d like to see a film that shows Jesus and his family embedded in this chaotic, unstable and traumatic social world, in a nation under Roman rule.

Instead, viewers have now been offered The Carpenter’s Son, a film starring Nicholas Cage. It’s partly inspired by an apocryphal (not biblical) text named the Paidika Iesou – the Childhood of Jesus – later called The Infancy Gospel of Thomas.

You might think the Paidika would be something like an ancient version of the hit TV show Smallville from the 2000s, which followed the boy Clark Kent before he became Superman.

But no, rather than being about Jesus grappling with his amazing powers and destiny, it is a short and quite disturbing piece of literature made up of bits and pieces, assembled more than 100 years after the life of Jesus.

The Paidika presents the young Jesus as a kind of demigod no one should mess with, including his playmates and teachers. It was very popular with non-Jewish, pagan-turned-Christian audiences who sat in an uneasy place within wider society.

The miracle-working Jesus zaps all his enemies – and even innocents. At one point, a child runs into Jesus and hurts his shoulder, so Jesus strikes him dead. Joseph says to Mary, “Do not let him out of the house so that those who make him angry may not die.”

Such stories rest on a problematic idea that one must never kindle a god’s wrath. And this young Jesus shows instant, deadly wrath. He also lacks much of a moral compass.

But this text also rests on the idea that Jesus’ boyhood actions against his playmates and teachers were justified because they were “the Jews”. “A Jew” turns up as an accuser just a few lines in. There should be a content warning.

The nativity scene from The Carpenter’s Son is certainly not peaceful. There is a lot of screaming and horrific images of Roman soldiers throwing babies into a fire. But, like so many films, the violence is somehow just evil and arbitrary, not really about Judaea and Rome.

It is surely the contextual, bigger story of the nativity and Jesus’ childhood that is so relevant today, in our times of fracturing and “othering”, where so many feel under the thumb of the unyielding powers of this world.

In fact, some churches in the United States are now reflecting this contemporary relevance as they adapt nativity scenes to depict ICE detentions and deportations of immigrants and refugees.

In many ways, the real nativity is indeed not a simple one of peace and joy, but rather one of struggle – and yet mystifying hope.

Joan Taylor has previously received funding from the Leverhulme Trust, Wellcome Trust, Fulbright Commission, Palestine Exploration Fund and other scholarly societies.

– ref. What world was Jesus born into? A historian describes the turbulent times of the real nativity – https://theconversation.com/what-world-was-jesus-born-into-a-historian-describes-the-turbulent-times-of-the-real-nativity-268080

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Andrew Latham, Professor of Political Science, Macalester College

President Donald Trump is reportedly setting his sights on a Christmas peace deal in the Ukraine-Russia war.

The timing is apt. Every December, political leaders reach instinctively for the language of goodwill. Meanwhile, diplomats the world over use the season to host parties at which gift-giving and booze are used to help foster friendships.

The notion that the holiday season might bring a respite from conflict has deep roots in history. Medieval “Christmas peace” laws in northern Europe at one point punished crimes committed during the season with harsher penalties, enshrining in law a cultural sense of expectation for quiet and restraint.

Finland still reads the Declaration of Christmas Peace each Christmas Eve – a ceremonial reminder of an older hope that violence might briefly ebb.

Today’s “Christmas diplomacy” – that is, a range of statements and efforts to encourage peace and warm relations between nations — updates the tradition for statecraft.

Sometimes, such diplomacy really does open a window for talks. Sometimes it is a cultural reflex. Sometimes it is pure theater. And sometimes, the season’s distractions are exploited for war and violence rather than peace.

The most famous of them all

The Treaty of Ghent that ended the War of 1812 between the United States and Great Britain was signed on Christmas Eve. It was a signal that both sides were ready to convert seasonal sentiment into durable peace.

But the most famous example of the season interrupting conflict is the Christmas Truce of 1914. After months of fighting along parts of the Western Front in World War I, soldiers on opposing sides left the trenches to sing, retrieve the dead and share a moment of humanity before returning to the industrial warfare from which many of them would never return.

This act was repeated during the Battle of the Bulge in World War II, when a small number of American and German soldiers struck a temporary truce in the Hürtgen Forest during Christmas 1944.

A seasonal opening to dialogue?

More recently, governments and nongovernmental actors have leveraged the holidays to open the door for future peace negotiations.

In Northern Ireland, for example, the Provisional IRA repeatedly declared Christmas ceasefires, most notably in December 1974 when it announced a halt to operations from Dec. 22 through early January. While the truce ultimately collapsed, it reflected a recurring pattern during The Troubles in which Christmas provided a culturally resonant moment to signal openness to dialogue.

A similar logic was observed more recently in Colombia, where in 2022, the National Liberation Army (ELN) declared a unilateral Christmas ceasefire, explicitly tying the pause in hostilities to ongoing peace negotiations with the government.

In both cases, Christmas functioned not as a sentimental interruption to war, but as a strategic moment to legitimize restraint and probe whether diplomacy could bring an end to the underlying conflict.

But as with any temporary ceasefire, Christmas truces can be prone to violations. During the Vietnam War, warring parties in 1971 agreed to a 24-hour Christmas truce. A report from The New York Times the following day included allegations of 19 violations by the Vietcong and 170 by American and South Vietnamese forces.

The holidays can also serve as an opportunity to catch an enemy off guard.

Seven years before the short-lived 1971 Christmas truce, Vietcong fighters chose Christmas Eve to launch an attack on a hotel where U.S. officers were celebrating. Two Americans were killed and 28 were injured.

The Soviet Union launched its 1979 invasion of Afghanistan on Christmas Eve, and Israel’s 2008 Gaza operation began on Dec. 27. The logic here is that in late December, political bandwidth in national capitals is thin, diplomatic machinery moves more slowly and the opportunity for surprise is greater.

‘Tis the season for …

Christmas diplomacy can therefore be used to encourage peace – or war.

It can also be used to deepen existing bilateral friendships.

A well-known example is Norway’s annual donation of Christmas trees to the United Kingdom. The practice began in 1947, when Oslo sent a giant spruce to London’s Trafalgar Square as a thank-you for British support during World War II. It has since become a ritualized expression of common history, shared sacrifice and enduring alliance.

And embassies around the world host Christmas receptions that function as informal diplomatic spaces – occasions where tensions ease, conversations flow more freely and difficult issues can be broached in a more relaxed setting.

These practices do not resolve crises but lay important groundwork for goodwill and access.

Christmas diplomacy endures because it stands at the crossroads of culture, power and politics. The season brings with it a set of expectations about restraint and goodwill that leaders can invoke, diplomats can exploit and adversaries can either honor or abuse.

This article is part of a series explaining foreign policy terms commonly used but rarely explained.

Andrew Latham does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. From truce in the trenches to cocktails at the consulate: How Christmas diplomacy seeks to exploit seasonal goodwill – https://theconversation.com/from-truce-in-the-trenches-to-cocktails-at-the-consulate-how-christmas-diplomacy-seeks-to-exploit-seasonal-goodwill-271478

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Vitomir Kovanovic, Associate Professor and Associate Director of the Centre for Change and Complexity in Learning (C3L), Education Futures, University of South Australia

Over the past three years, generative artificial intelligence (AI) has had a profound impact on society. AI’s impact on human writing, in particular, has been enormous.

The large language models that power AI tools such as ChatGPT are trained on a wide variety of textual data, and they can now produce complex and high-quality texts of their own.

Most importantly, the widespread use of AI tools has resulted in hyperproduction of so-called “AI slop”: low-quality AI-generated outputs produced with minimal or even no human effort.

Much has been said about what AI writing means for education, work, and culture. But what about science? Does AI improve academic writing, or does it merely produce “scientific AI slop”?

According to a new study by researchers from UC Berkeley and Cornell University, published in Science, the slop is winning.

Generative AI boosts academic productivity

The researchers analysed abstracts from more than a million preprint articles (publicly available articles yet to undergo peer review) released between 2018 and 2024.

They examined whether use of AI is linked to higher academic productivity, manuscript quality and use of more diverse literature.

The number of preprints an author produced was a measure of their productivity, while eventual publication in a journal was a measure of an article’s quality.

The study found that when an author started using AI, the number of preprints they produced increased dramatically. Depending on the preprint platform, the overall number of articles an author published per month after adopting AI increased between 36.2% and 59.8%.

The increase was biggest among non-native English speakers, and especially for Asian authors, where it ranged from 43% to 89.3%. For authors from English-speaking institutions and with “Caucasian” names, the increase was more modest, in the range of 23.7% to 46.2%.

These results suggest AI was often used by non-native speakers to improve their written English.

What about the article quality?

The study found articles written with AI used more complex language on average than those written without AI.

However, among articles written without AI, ones that used more complex language were more likely to be published.

This suggests that more complex and high-quality writing is perceived as having greater scientific merit.

However, when it comes to articles written with AI support, this relationship was reversed – the more complex the language, the less likely the article was to be published. This suggests that AI-generated complex language was used to hide the low quality of the scholarly work.

AI increased the variety of academic sources

The study also looked at the differences in article downloads originating from Google and Microsoft search platforms.

Microsoft’s Bing search engine introduced an AI-powered Bing Chat feature in February 2023. This allowed the researchers to compare what kind of articles were recommended by AI-enhanced search versus regular search engine.

Interestingly, Bing users were exposed to a greater variety of sources than Google users, and also to more recent publications. This is likely caused by a technique used by Bing Chat called retrieval-augmented generation, which combines search results with AI prompting.

In any case, fears that AI search would be “stuck” recommending old, widely used sources was not justified.

Moving forward

AI has had significant impact on scientific writing and academic publishing. It has become an integral part of academic writing for many scientists, especially for non-native speakers and it is here to stay.

As AI is becoming embedded in many applications such as word processors, email apps, and spreadsheets, it will be soon impossible not to use AI whether we like it or not.

Most importantly for science, AI is challenging the use of complex high-quality language as the indicator of scholarly merit. Quick screening and evaluation of articles based on language quality is increasingly unreliable and better methods are urgently needed.

As complex language is increasingly used to cover up weak scholarly contributions, critical and in-depth evaluations of study methodologies and contributions during peer review are essential.

One approach is to “fight fire with fire” and use AI review tools, such as the one recently published by Andrew Ng at Stanford. Given the ever-growing number of manuscript submissions and already high workload of academic journal editors, such approaches might be the only viable option.

Vitomir Kovanovic does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. What the hyperproduction of AI slop is doing to science – https://theconversation.com/what-the-hyperproduction-of-ai-slop-is-doing-to-science-272250

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Christopher Tounsel, Associate Professor of History, University of Washington

Sudan’s brutal civil war has dragged on for more than 2½ years, displacing millions and killing in excess of 150,000 people – making it among the most deadly conflicts in the world today.

As of December 2025, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces appear to be making gains, seizing a key oil field in central Sudan and forcing the retreat of the Sudanese Armed Forces in key cities in the country’s west.

But fighting has ebbed and flowed throughout the war, with parts of the country changing hands a number of times. It has left a complicated picture of a nation mired in violence. Here’s a visual guide to help understand what is going on and the toll it has taken on the Sudanese population.

What military forces are involved?

The two main warring parties are the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

The SAF is the nation’s official military. Prior to the civil war, it was responsible with enforcing the border, protecting the country from foreign entities and maintaining internal security. As of April 2023, the SAF had an estimated force of up to 200,000 people.

The paramilitary RSF is a semi-autonomous organization that was created in 2013 to confront rebel groups. Its origins lie in the feared Janjaweed militia that gained international notoriety for its scorched-earth tactics, extrajudicial killings and sexual assaults during a campaign in Darfur between 2003 and 2005.

Rebranding as the RSF, the paramilitary force evolved to become President Omar al-Bashir’s personal security force before al-Bashir’s ouster in 2019.

After that, the RSF and the SAF worked together to stage a 2021 coup against Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok in 2021. But a power struggle emerged between the leaders of the RSF and SAF amid disagreements over the future direction of the country and whether the RSF would be incorporated into the army.

By the outbreak of the civil war in 2023, the RSF had amassed around 100,000 troops.

Various other armed groups have lent their support to the RSF and SAF during the conflict, including the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North, which supports the RSF, and the army-aligned Justice and Equality Movement

Who are the main leaders?

The SAF is led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the nation’s top military commander and de facto head of state. The longtime soldier rose to the rank of regional commander in 2008 and was promoted a decade later to the position of army chief of staff.

Following Bashir’s 2019 ouster, Burhan was appointed to lead the Transitional Military Council and its successor civilian-military entity known as the Sovereign Council. As leader of the Sovereign Council, Burhan occupied the nation’s highest office.

His reputation has been marred by his own military’s attacks on civilians in Darfur in the early 2000s and, more recently, his reliance on support from Islamist groups.

The RSF leader, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as “Hemedti,” was Burhan’s second-in-command.

Born to a poor family that settled in Darfur, Hemedti was part of the Janjaweed militia that President Bashir deployed to crush non-Arab resistance in the country’s west. Becoming leader of the Janjaweed before going on to head the RSF, Hemedti acquired a reputation as a ruthless commander whose brutal methods disturbed some fellow officers.

Where are the weapons, funding coming from?

While the fighting has largely been contained to within Sudan’s boundaries, it is being fueled from outside the country.

Amnesty International has reported that despite a decades-old arms embargo by the United Nations Security Council, recently manufactured weapons and equipment from China, Russia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates have been used by both sides in the conflict.

The Sudanese government has accused the UAE of providing military assistance to the RSF, which in turn has been accused of using the UAE for illegal gold trafficking.

In addition to providing military assistance, the UAE has been accused of providing economic support for the RSF. In January 2025, the Biden administration sanctioned seven UAE-based companies funding Hemedti.

Saudi Arabia, which sees Sudan as an ally to counter Iran’s regional influence, has provided financial support to the SAF. In October 2025, the SAF-backed government announced that Saudi Arabia planned to invest an additional US$50 billion into Sudan, on top of the $35 billion it has already invested.

Egypt, allied with Burhan in a dispute with Ethiopia over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, has supplied the SAF with warplanes and pilots.

Meanwhile, Iran and Russia have each extended support for the Sudanese government. It is believed that Iran, which renewed diplomatic ties with Sudan in October 2023, has provided the SAF with attack drones, while Russia has provided Sudan’s government with diplomatic and military support.

What areas are controlled by whom?

As of December 2025, the RSF and SAF control different halves of the country split along a roughly north-south axis. The SAF controls a little more than half of the country.

The SAF has a stronghold in the nation’s capital Khartoum. In the east, the army controls the city of Port Sudan on the Red Sea coast. The SAF also controls approximately three-quarters of the Sudanese border with Egypt to the north.

Strategically, the areas under SAF control provide the advantages of access to the Red Sea – a crucial transport hub through which 12% of the world’s maritime trade passes – as well as the historic demographic and administrative epicenter of Khartoum, situated at the confluence of the Blue and White Niles, and the livestock-rich Kassala state.

In all, Sudanese researcher Jihad Mashamoun estimates that as of November 2025, the SAF controlled 60% of the country.

Meanwhile, the RSF has consolidated control over Darfur – the massive western region that has been a hub for gold mining and trafficking routes – and the regional capital of el-Fasher, an economic hub connecting routes to Libya to the north, the Nile to the east and Chad to the west.

As researcher Bravin Onditi has noted, el-Fasher’s fall to the RSF in late October eliminated the SAF’s last stronghold in Darfur from which it could assert authority in western Sudan.

Outside of Darfur, the RSF controls most the country’s oil fields, many of the goldfields in central and southwest Sudan, and splits control over important grazing lands with the SAF.

What has been the toll on Sudan’s citizens?

One of the war’s distinguishing horrors has been repeated incidents of civilian killings.

Both sides have been accused of war crimes that include targeted attacks on civilians, medical centers and food systems. Mass killings in Khartoum, Darfur, Kordofan, Gezira, Sennar and White Nile states reflect the general scope of slaughter that has swept the country.

In some instances, this violence has taken on a decidedly ethnic dimension. Human Rights Watch reports that from late April to early November 2023, the RSF and its allied militias systematically sought to remove — including by murder — ethnic Masalit people from El Geneina, capital of West Darfur.

In October 2025, following the RAF’s siege of el-Fasher, the world watched in horror as satellite images of “clusters” consistent with bodies and blood-red discoloration could be seen on the ground. The U.N. Security Council held an emergency meeting condemning the RSF’s killing of nearly 500 people in el-Fasher’s Saudi Maternity Hospital.

More than 9.5 million people are classified as internally displaced, having fled violence. The International Organization for Migration reports that North and South Darfur states host the largest number of internally displaced people, followed by Central and East Darfur states.

Meanwhile, over 4 million have fled to the neighboring countries of Egypt, South Sudan and Chad.

Image sources:

FD-63 – Dağlıoğlu Silah,
Saiga MK .223, Kalashnikov Group,
Tigr DMR, Kalashnikov Group,
M05E1, Zastava Arms,
PP87 82MM mortar bomb, Amnesty International,
CKJ-G7 drone jammer, Amnesty International,
Streit Gladiator, Streit Group,
Terrier LT-79, Streit Group,
INKAS Titan-S, INKAS Armored Vehicles

Christopher Tounsel does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Sudan’s civil war: A visual guide to the brutal conflict – https://theconversation.com/sudans-civil-war-a-visual-guide-to-the-brutal-conflict-271429